


Ready

by cobra_judy (lo_rez)



Series: All In Green [6]
Category: Robin Hood BBC
Genre: Enemies, Episode Related, F/M, Unrequited Love, Villains
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-17
Updated: 2007-12-17
Packaged: 2017-10-02 00:14:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 362
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lo_rez/pseuds/cobra_judy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gisborne, the hangman's rope, and the limits of power.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ready

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers for episode 2x11, Treasure of the Nation.

Even long afterward, when they've told each other more lies, broken more promises than there are grains of sand in the desert, Gisborne's memory of her on that day is as keen as good steel: cutting away what doesn't matter, laying the heart of things bare.

His first dreams of her were among the casualties, of course; he's not sure he'll ever forgive her for that. But the reality of her is too bright and substantial; his dream-Marian, sweet and thorny as an Isfahan rose, faded fast. He'd looked at her that day, seen the certainty in her eyes, steady on the waiting rope, and knew he'd never really wanted anything before. "I am ready," she'd said.

There are things he won't do for her. There are things she'll do to him that she'd never stoop to but for the war they fight, when they must, against each other. He'll break men for power, as Locksley will do for what he calls justice; but she, she'll do it for freedom: break even herself if there's no other choice.

"Make this place bearable," he'd said: this place, this world, my heart, my life; and she'd given him a child's kiss, a friend's glad embrace. But even now, long afterward, he knows she heard him plain. They've cut each other deep; and if his stroke drew more blood, hers left a bit of herself, like a splinter of steel, in what passes for his soul.

At intervals, now, they watch each other across the gulf that separates her kind from his. When they meet, as they must do, there's always a moment when the air between them ignites with rage, or pain -- or sometimes, to his eternal surprise, laughter; and they both burn, he knows it, even when it's only words and not blows they're trading. He's learned to call it hope, that splinter in his heart.

For what, he's not sure. His dreams of her now are wilder, there's hell as well as heaven in her eyes, and he always wakes, sweating, as he takes her hand and kisses her mouth at last and tells her, "I am ready."

*

 

[end]

December 17, 2007


End file.
